I worked out the chords for the fourth line of “A Cannes cet été” (To Cannes This Summer) by Boris Vian.
I finished working out the chords for “Variations sur le même t'aime” (Variations on the Usual I Love You) by Serge Gainsbourg. I ran through singing and playing it in French. I revised some of my translation and I need to work on that some more next time but I’ll probably have the song uploaded to my Christian’s Translations blog tomorrow.
My Martin acoustic guitar sound better since Gian adjusted it.
I played my Gibson Les Paul Studio electric guitar during song practice and it was also more in tune and less rattly than before. But I couldn’t sing and had to croak the songs pretty much in a talking voice.
I weighed 85.95 kilos before breakfast.
After shaving and showering I headed out for an early bike ride because I wanted to shop for candy for my daughter. I was looking for candy stores where I haven’t been to see if any of them had anything new and interesting. I was going to go all the way downtown to check out some candy stores on Yonge and then to stop at the Candy Bar at College and Ossington on my way home. But the Candy Bar got such great reviews I decided to go there first. I was first of all surprised by how small the place is. The only things they have that other stores don’t are some of their packaged European candies, mostly from England. When I was looking at the bulk items the proprietor told me that for any loose items they do the scooping. Considering that all the other bulk stores in Toronto trust their customers to do their own scooping, that seemed too controlling for me. It’s like Tim Hortons putting he cream in your coffee rather than letting you decide. So I decided not to get any bulk items, especially since The Bulk Barn has everything they have plus a lot more. I bought a can of Taveners sour lemon drops and a bag of Bonds rhubarb and custard candies. As her young assistant was ringing me up, the owner called out, “There’s no tax today. Thanks Justin!” At first I thought the cashier’s name was Justin, but then I realized she meant Justin Trudeau. When I left I had to pee and it was already 14:30 and so I just went home. On Sunday when I can get going earlier I’ll head downtown to check out some candy stores on Yonge.
I weighed 85.35 kilos before a late lunch at 15:00, which is the lightest I’ve been in the early afternoon since last Friday.
I weighed 86.45 at 18:00. That’s the heaviest I’ve been in the evening since December 5.
I was caught up on my journal at 19:37.
I continued to work on the first frame of the second wave of my rainbow animation. I’m almost done filling in the spaces between the rainbows.
I had a small potato with gravy and a chicken breast while watching season 1, episodes 3 and 4 of the Batman TV series. I watched the first two episodes months ago and it was a story involving the Riddler. This story was also a two parter.
In season 1, episode 3, outside of a jewellery store two men in black and wearing bowler hats are giving out umbrellas. They claim that one of the umbrellas will win a prize in the jewellery store. The pedestrians go inside and open the umbrellas to see if they won. All of the umbrellas emit harmless sparks like roman candles and give off loud noises. They are not dangerous in themselves but cause confusion and panic. The police conclude that only The Penguin could be behind it and they call Batman. Dick is learning French verbs when they get the call. At police HQ they learn that no actual crime was committed. Robin thinks the Penguin was faking one crime to mask another. Penguin just got out of prison and Batman wonders if the Penguin has reformed and if the whole thing was just a practical joke. They watch closed circuit video that was secretly shot of the Penguin when he was incarcerated. They hear him plotting his next crime and he has the idea to make Batman a partner. Batman looks for new umbrella factories and finds the most likely one to have the Penguin behind it is K.G. Bird Umbrellas. Meanwhile at Penguin’s headquarters we learn that Penguin has no crime planned whatsoever. He’s going to keep making public umbrella displays and he’s going to let Batman treat them like clues and speculate the Penguin’s plot. Then the Penguin will commit the crime that the Batman imagines and so Batman will indeed become inadvertently the Penguin’s partner. There is another umbrella giveaway outside of a bank. Batman confiscates the umbrellas and covers them in an asbestos blanket. They go off as before but there is again no crime. Batman and Robin go to the KG Bird factory and confront Penguin. He reminds them that he is not responsible for his umbrellas after they leave his factory and Batman realizes he’s right. A few minutes later the Penguin launches a giant umbrella that lands upside down in the middle of the street in front of the Batmobile. From the handle high above dangles a colourful but normal sized umbrella. Thinking it must be a clue Batman climbs up to fetch it. They take it back to the Batcave to analyze it but it is an ordinary umbrella that reveals nothing. Batman decides to go to Penguin’s factory as Bruce Wayne to plant a small bugging device that looks like a spider. Penguin does not recognize Bruce, who comes in as a customer. But when Bruce tries to plant the bug an alarm goes off and a net falls from the ceiling. Penguin gasses Bruce to knock him out. He thinks Bruce is some kind of industrial spy and tells his men to eliminate him by putting him in the tempering furnace where they forge the umbrella ribs. Bruce is placed on a conveyor belt that slowly rolls him toward the 10,000 degree furnace and that is the cliff-hanger.
In season 1, episode 4, Bruce is roused by the heat but restrained by the net as he advances towards the furnace. He just manages to pull from his breast pocket a cigarette lighter that is filled with compressed butane. He tosses it into the furnace causing an explosion, the concussion of which throws him free of the conveyor belt. Penguin lets him go because he figures he won’t go to the cops since he was committing a crime by bugging his shop. Batman returns to the Batcave and he and Robin resume their analysis of the colourful umbrella they retrieved from the handle of the giant umbrella earlier. But they don’t realize that the umbrella is bugged and the Penguin is listening. The dynamic duo concludes from the colours of the umbrella that the Penguin might be after the jewelled meteorite at the museum. But Batman checks the plans of the museum and finds that it’s burglar-proof. Robin says the colours of the umbrella are like a beautiful dawn. That makes Batman think of Dawn Robins the famous movie star who is in Gotham shooting a film called The Mockingbird produced by Ward Eagle and she is staying in the Pelican Arms Hotel. Batman looks at the hotel plans and sees that it’s a perfect setup. Penguin can set up on the rooftop across the street and run a line across to Dawn’s penthouse. Meanwhile Penguin is taking notes for the crime that Batman has conceived. Batman and Robin go to Dawn’s hotel and climb up to her balcony. Dawn has never heard of Batman because she’s from out of town but she thinks he’s cute. The Penguin and his men cross over to Dawn’s hotel exactly as Batman said he would. He knocks out Dawn and her manager. But suddenly Batman and Robin burst in wearing gas masks. But Penguin turns on his powerful Penguin magnet, which attracts the metal that Batman and Robin are wearing and pins them to the wall. Penguin escapes with Dawn Robin. Batman and Robin are stuck until hotel staff find them at midnight. Penguin wants $20,000 ransom for Dawn Robins and the exchange is to be made in the front hall of Wayne Manor. Batman and Robin say they will hide inside of the two suits of armour that decorate the hall and when Dawn is safe they’ll grab the Penguin. Later the money is at Wayne Manor and Alfred the butler answers the door. He is gassed and knocked out. He is carried to a couch. The Penguin gasses the two suits of armour and lifts the helmets to see that Batman and Robin are indeed unconscious. The still unconscious Dawn is placed beside Alfred with her head against his. After the Penguin and his men leave with the money, Aunt Harriet comes downstairs and is scandalized to see Alfred and Dawn seemingly snuggled up together. Penguin returns to his lair with the loot but Batman and Robin are waiting for them. The suits of armour only contained dummies. They figured out that they were being bugged by Penguin’s umbrella. There is an umbrella duel between the heroes and the villains. That leads to fists and sound effects spelled out in the air as usual. The Penguin and his finks are vanquished. Later at a party at Bruce Wayne’s house, Dawn is disinterested because she is hopelessly in love with her saviour, the Batman.
The Penguin was played by Burgess Meredith, whose father was Canadian. Burgess joined Eva Le Gallienne’s Repertory Stage Company in 1929. By 1934 he was a Broadway star in Little Ol’ Boy. He starred on Broadway in Winterset in 1936 and his film debut was the same part in the film adaptation. In the early 1950s his film career was waylaid when he was blacklisted as an Unfriendly Witness by the House of Un-American Activities. With the help of Otto Preminger he started getting work again in the 60s. He was so popular as the Penguin that the producers always had a script ready for him. He developed his Penguin laugh out of the cough that the cigarette caused. He co-starred in Torture Garden and Printer’s Devil. He starred in Of Mice and Men, The Story of G.I. Joe, and On Our Merry Way. He co-starred in the Rocky films and The Day of the Locust. For the latter and one Rocky film he was nominated for Academy Awards. He co-starred in Foul Play, Clash of the Titans, Second Chorus, Diary of a Chambermaid, Skidoo, Stay Away Joe, The Last Chase, and The Man on the Eiffel Tower (which he also directed). He directed The Yin and Yang of Mr. Go. He starred in several episodes of The Twilight Zone. He was a prize winning equestrian.
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